Innovative Cities Lecture – The Power of “I Don’t Know."

Young Kim, Executive Director of the Fondy Food Center will deliver a lecture titled "The Power of “I Don’t Know.” Creating accessible, fair, and real food for Milwaukee’s North Side Communities." The lecture will discuss Milwaukee's successes with regards to creating innovative food systems and provide an outlook for how Milwaukee can continue these efforts into the future, highlighting examples of Good Food efforts underway in the city.

About Young Kim: Young Kim has been the Executive Director of Milwaukee’s Fondy Food Center since 2003. The organization connects North Side Milwaukee to local, healthy food – from the farm to the table. Fondy fulfills its mission by operating the city’s largest farmers market, food stamp and produce consumption incentive programs, cooking education, and, most recently, a new 80-acre vegetable farm in Port Washington. The Fondy Food Center is a founding member of the Lindsay Heights Neighborhood Health Alliance – a consortium of nonprofits and residents working to improve the health of North Side Milwaukee residents.

Young is the recipient of the 2006 Wisconsin Hunger Hero and the 2012 Doug Janssen Emerging Milwaukee Leader Awards. He currently volunteers as Past President of the Community Food Security Coalition, a Portland, OR-based coalition of 425 North American organizations working to make quality food available at all levels of society.

Before to moving to Milwaukee, Young lived in Seattle working with that city’s homeless population. He believes in taking the long way around, and his corporate job experiences include stints as a custom bicycle wheel builder and bicycle component purchasing agent with factories in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and Hong Kong.

A second generation Korean American who was born and raised in the American Deep South, Young is always on the lookout for culturally significant recipes. When he’s not thinking of food and food systems, he likes to read poetry, restore vintage fountain pens, and work on his standup comedy routine. A graduate of Oberlin College, he lives in Wauwatosa with his wife, the Rev. Suzelle Lynch, and daughter, Grace.

Transit Information:The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee area is in a walkable, bike-able, urban neighborhood that is served by several transit lines, including the Milwaukee County Transit System, Badger Bus, and Wisconsin Coach Lines. Please consider utilizing public transit to get to UWM and avoid the hassle of parking.